The Battle With Mr. Covey by Frederick Douglass

Douglass explains in great detail how he felt after the fight with Mr. Covey. "I felt as I never felt before. It was a glorious resurrection from the tomb of slavery to the heaven of freedom. My long- crushed spirit rose, cowardice departed, bold defiance took its place..." He wrote about the resurgence of his will to live and the determination he had to become free. He describes his intentions perfectly with little room for interpretation, which is a defining characteristic of realism writing.
Douglass is obviously throwing into harsh light the "bitterest dregs of slavery" with his retelling of his time with Mr. Covey. First he tells of how Mr. Covey broke his "body, soul, and spirit". Mr. Covey worked slaves so hard that Douglass says it completely changed him, "My natural elasticity was crushed, my intellect languished, the disposition to read departed, the cheerful spark that lingered about my eye died; the dark night of slavery closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed into a brute!" Douglass is trying to get people to understand how truely awful slavery is by realating the harsh conditions he and his fellow slaves were subject to.